VR is neat, but I'm absolutely inspired by the idea of improved human-computer interfaces like those described and their more mundane uses. We have eye tracking, the ability to read electrical signals and positioning from hands or head, the ability to feedback to the body through vibration (or sound), and existing high quality peripherals like keyboards for high precision entry and correction. There has to be a way to combine all of this into a better vim.
A couple binary inputs for CTRL and SHIFT from reading brainwaves seems doable. Feedback on whether they're active from different high frequency vibrations on the hands, neck, or ears.
There are lots of easy wins here if I can just push a couple mental buttons with my brain. Trigger scrolling or text selection based on eye movement. Select a buffer or macro based the mental buttons I'm pushing. You basically get a binary digit for every mental button you're capable of simultaneously tracking.
I'm home sick, and maybe it's the fever talking, but I think I'm going to do some basic research and start hacking something together. Very small chance of success, but I want mental modifier keys with vibrational feedback!
Summary: BCIs are still bad, use foot pedals as suggested in the sibling comment.
I don't want to rain on the parade but BCI (brain computer interfaces here EEG that is interpreted as input for something) is far from being usable for everday things. The technology sort of works but it is slow and unreliable. Most reliable method was P300 [0] which requires several repetitions of a signal someone decided to select. Entering letters for example can be done by flashing rows and columns of a matrix of these letters and concentrating on the one to choose. It's reactive in the sense as it will only trigger when an expected stimulus is detected.
A lot less reliable was a system trained to recognize imagined motions (raising the left or right leg or arm as different categories) and worst method I saw was a simple feedback loop between EEG for moving something on the screen in one of two directions. This rarely worked even though it was a simple binary choice.
Any switch will be better than this for now.
FB is kinda badly positioned when it comes to man-machine interfaces, not because of their technical capability, but the lack of trust that is needed for societal acceptance in that space. People who initially supported Oculus wouldn't have done so if it came out being from FB, they wouldn't have gotten over the initial hump.
I think that this is one of the reasons why Apple bets so heavily on privacy, they had a much better long term vision when it comes to wearables and man-machine interfaces in general. If Cook distances Apple from China they have such a big advantage there, if not FB will use Apples connection with China to their advantage.
This is the age of vertical integration in technology. Truly astounding to see, and not something we've witnessed much of historically.
Personally I think a lot of it is being driven by the comoditization of advanced chip fabrication. Now with TSMC you can actually have better manufacturing capabilities than Intel. A situation we've not been in for over 30 years.
> Personally I think a lot of it is being driven by the commoditization of advanced chip fabrication.
That's an interesting perspective. With mobile device chip manufacturing being modularized, Facebook is able to integrate forward with the end user by combining software (i.e. their portfolio of apps) with consumer electronics.
There's no getting around the fact that developing AR technology requires substantial investment in R&D. Only companies such as Facebook, ones that employ some of the best engineers and also have a strong incentive to make that investment, are able to pull it off.
Whatever product comes out of Facebook under its current business model will be optimized for serving ads. Not necessarily serving the user.
This in itself is not bad, as it will still stimulate the growth of an ecosystem where developers can create products with different business models.
And as such they will not do it because people don't use such devices currently. It needs to be the other way around: have the devices, people start using them more and more, and only then come Google and Facebook to destroy the system with ads.
I don’t want to sound mean spirited, but I don’t really like or trust FB. I would check my feed briefly once or twice a month and post something whenever I finished a book and wanted to announce that.
My attitude changed when I bought an Oculus Go and a week later when I bought an Oculus Quest. These devices use the FB platform, and all the videos that I now upload to FB can now be watched in the VR theater on the Oculus devices.
So basically, the Oculus products are so good that I decided to give FB another chance and I use FB a bit more often now.
EDIT: and the Star Wars Vader Immortal trilogy on the Oculus Quest is my favorite entertainment experience ever, including the industrial strength VR experiences I used to work on. My respect to the teams that did the Vader Immortal material.
It's interesting how a number of Facebook engineers are willing to comment on what they work on, while the company itself refuses to provide any official statements.
You can assume anyone named and quoted in an article like this is speaking officially on behalf of the company they are working for, with some level of preparation and filtering by their Comms team.
Nah. This kind of segmentation of what can be disclosed exists even within engineering. E.g. in https://softwareengineeringdaily.com/2019/12/17/kubernetes-a... Karl Isenberg is willing to talk pretty freely about their CI/CD pipeline but is very cautious and doesn't give specifics when talking about the pipeline for pushing firmware updates to cars.
I think a better analogy is probably that engineers are also not willing to implement any feature anyone asks for.
The company has a lot of public statements that are easy to find, and the people who aren’t “providing comments” are likely either working on the next ones or think providing this comment would not be helpful to the company (including taking into account how much time they can invest in it).
Of course none of this is specific to FB in any way.
I think it has the ability to do more once it is sufficiently miniaturized. Small to the point that it’s not much different than wearing eye glasses.
Glasses can make a viral and sticky form factor that we already have centuries of experience with. If we can build an AR glasses product people want to wear then we have the potential to greatly increase the amount of digital information a human sees and processes. This information can be addictive, like smartphones, and of high utility, like smartphones.
Look at the success of wireless earbuds, they will be part of distributed wearable AR systems, they're screenless AR that exist already. AR doesn't always mean screens. Glasses can replace screens, but they won't be worn by everybody like Phones, so AR glasses will first compete with desktop, laptop and tablet screens in more professional environments. It can only go mainstream like phones in contact lens form, or some kind of iris projector that sits on your nose, likely still powered by a watch or a phone. Not sure if we see that in the next decade though.
[+] [-] dang|6 years ago|reply
https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&que...
There's a related thread at https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21836862.
[+] [-] caseymarquis|6 years ago|reply
A couple binary inputs for CTRL and SHIFT from reading brainwaves seems doable. Feedback on whether they're active from different high frequency vibrations on the hands, neck, or ears.
There are lots of easy wins here if I can just push a couple mental buttons with my brain. Trigger scrolling or text selection based on eye movement. Select a buffer or macro based the mental buttons I'm pushing. You basically get a binary digit for every mental button you're capable of simultaneously tracking.
I'm home sick, and maybe it's the fever talking, but I think I'm going to do some basic research and start hacking something together. Very small chance of success, but I want mental modifier keys with vibrational feedback!
[+] [-] _Microft|6 years ago|reply
I don't want to rain on the parade but BCI (brain computer interfaces here EEG that is interpreted as input for something) is far from being usable for everday things. The technology sort of works but it is slow and unreliable. Most reliable method was P300 [0] which requires several repetitions of a signal someone decided to select. Entering letters for example can be done by flashing rows and columns of a matrix of these letters and concentrating on the one to choose. It's reactive in the sense as it will only trigger when an expected stimulus is detected. A lot less reliable was a system trained to recognize imagined motions (raising the left or right leg or arm as different categories) and worst method I saw was a simple feedback loop between EEG for moving something on the screen in one of two directions. This rarely worked even though it was a simple binary choice. Any switch will be better than this for now.
[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/P300_(neuroscience)
[+] [-] adrianN|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] inertiatic|6 years ago|reply
I'm curious what research is being done on this front.
[+] [-] unknown|6 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] deltron3030|6 years ago|reply
I think that this is one of the reasons why Apple bets so heavily on privacy, they had a much better long term vision when it comes to wearables and man-machine interfaces in general. If Cook distances Apple from China they have such a big advantage there, if not FB will use Apples connection with China to their advantage.
[+] [-] jdsully|6 years ago|reply
Personally I think a lot of it is being driven by the comoditization of advanced chip fabrication. Now with TSMC you can actually have better manufacturing capabilities than Intel. A situation we've not been in for over 30 years.
[+] [-] artyomavanesov|6 years ago|reply
That's an interesting perspective. With mobile device chip manufacturing being modularized, Facebook is able to integrate forward with the end user by combining software (i.e. their portfolio of apps) with consumer electronics.
Aggregation theory at work: https://stratechery.com/2015/aggregation-theory/
[+] [-] aaronblohowiak|6 years ago|reply
Goes in cycles. Xerox, hp, ibm
[+] [-] artyomavanesov|6 years ago|reply
Whatever product comes out of Facebook under its current business model will be optimized for serving ads. Not necessarily serving the user.
This in itself is not bad, as it will still stimulate the growth of an ecosystem where developers can create products with different business models.
[+] [-] twobat|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] arcturus17|6 years ago|reply
TBC
[+] [-] mark_l_watson|6 years ago|reply
My attitude changed when I bought an Oculus Go and a week later when I bought an Oculus Quest. These devices use the FB platform, and all the videos that I now upload to FB can now be watched in the VR theater on the Oculus devices.
So basically, the Oculus products are so good that I decided to give FB another chance and I use FB a bit more often now.
EDIT: and the Star Wars Vader Immortal trilogy on the Oculus Quest is my favorite entertainment experience ever, including the industrial strength VR experiences I used to work on. My respect to the teams that did the Vader Immortal material.
[+] [-] choward|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] ravenstine|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] mattlondon|6 years ago|reply
Guessing there is some geo-thing or A/B test going on.
[+] [-] saagarjha|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] nrp|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] pm90|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] xixixao|6 years ago|reply
The company has a lot of public statements that are easy to find, and the people who aren’t “providing comments” are likely either working on the next ones or think providing this comment would not be helpful to the company (including taking into account how much time they can invest in it).
Of course none of this is specific to FB in any way.
[+] [-] neiman|6 years ago|reply
I love XR (=VR/AR/MR), but I still didn't manage a good easy open source way to do that.
[+] [-] pabs3|6 years ago|reply
https://monado.dev/ https://www.khronos.org/openxr/
[+] [-] onlyrealcuzzo|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] tessting|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] npo9|6 years ago|reply
Glasses can make a viral and sticky form factor that we already have centuries of experience with. If we can build an AR glasses product people want to wear then we have the potential to greatly increase the amount of digital information a human sees and processes. This information can be addictive, like smartphones, and of high utility, like smartphones.
[+] [-] deltron3030|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] KaiserPro|6 years ago|reply
being able to overlay information, in context, onto objects that it relates to, will be massive.
But only eventually.